JPF Home Page Forums Lyric and MP3 Feedback MP3 Feedback Forum The Business of Cruelty

EDIT - New Link Below though this is not done.

I am still working on this but wanted to put up the revised link that is now active. I will eventually reply to all and have a listen to tracks up by the folks who have responded. I've just been holding off b/c this is not done. I had Mike Z. take my guitar, vox, drums, etc. and add stuff/subtract stuff/redo stuff. I'm still on the fence re: my vocal for this. Biblical spoken word part is gone. And I'm getting the "nasty" guitar solo as well but that will be another couple of weeks. I have someone lined-up to do it.

ORIGINAL THOUGHTS BELOW

I think I am in over my head with this. I wanted to do something a bit different than my typical folk singer/songwriter stuff. I have been listening to lots of Lou Reed, PJ Harvey and Jefferson Airplane lately along with the usual course of Tom Waits. I think maybe this might fall into the Disaster Artist category.

I am going to add a nasty guitar solo in the break and I was thinking about some clanging, mechanical sounds. I am on the fence re: the crazy, biblical, spoken word part.

Anyway, if ya'll could provide some insights, like scrap this whole mess, I am appreciative.

The Business of Cruelty

https://soundcloud.com/mamby-p/the-business-of-cruelty-final-v11-small-band-hq-mp3

Get out the bone saw
Put on your rubber clothes
Get out the drill
Hook up the hose
Don't think about the children
The husbands and the wives
It's just the cost of doing business
They pay it with their lives

(Chorus)

Wipe the blood off your shoe
This is what we do
With a certain continuity
Here on the assembly line
At the business of cruelty

In the middle of the day
They scream so loud
At night you lay awake
Hearing that sound
So take another pill
Whistle while you work
You gotta hold em still
Oh they know its gonna hurt

(Chorus)
Wipe the blood off your shoe
It's what we do
With a certain ingenuity
Here on the assembly line
At the business of cruelty

So get out the bone saw
Your gasoline and knives
Play God with your matches
And go and strike those lives

(Chorus)

Wipe the blood off your shoe
This is what we do
With a certain impunity
Stoking the hell fires
At the business of cruelty

Wendy Wendy Wendy! I'm speechless! Something a bit different...ya think? This just drips of doom and dread. I take it that's what you were going for? I'm afraid the significance of the spoken word part was lost on me as I couldn't understand anything except "brothers keeper"? Your lower register was silky and sinister but I was thinking if you raised the vocal an octave for that final line it would add some dynamics and really hammer it home. Just a thought. Love it when you spread your wings.

Ricki

Wow! Loved everything about this - lyrics, melody, gloriously creepy production. My only slight criticism would be that I sometimes found it difficult to make out the words. If I hadn't had the lyrics in front of me, I would have missed some of it, which would have been a shame because it's great. That might just be my ears, of course.

Yes, I could sense you channeling your inner Lou Reed to some extent, but it's more than that.

Hi Wendy,


Real nice performance, cool song.
I will have to agree with the comments about hearing the vocals....
But I always enjoy a WENDY song :-)


Calvin


http://www.soundclick.com/bands/0/calvinstewart

Hi Wendy:

Are you sure you and Calvin didn't co-write this? LOL! Would have been nice if you had posted it on or before Halloween. I'll be whistling as I walk past the cemetery tonight!

----Dave

Wendy,

I think you’ve got something really good going on here—love the sound of this—very Jefferson Airpliane. Creepy, but compelling lyrics—your giving Calvin some competition in that department. Like this one a ton. Killer stuff—keep working it!

(Ha, just saw Dave Rice’s reference to Calvin—great minds and all that . . . )

Kindest regards,

Deej

Sorry for jumping on the Calvin bandwaggon too Wendy!
Hauntingly different which is always a bonus ( different that is)
Amazing where that muse keads us
Best of luck with it
Travis

Hey Ricki,

Thanks for listening to this. It is definitely outside my comfort zone. This is the first new song I have been able to write to a point that I actually didn't throw it in the trash. I have been working on stuff but self-editing to the point that I quit for a time.

The spoken-word part is just some dialogue from the bible where Cain slays Abel. God asks him where his brother is and Cain asks God "am I my brother's keeper?"

The murder of the Saudi journalist along with the politics of the day inspired this. I feel like the world is moving in a terrible direction. I don't know what to do other than write about it.

I think going up in places on the vox will add some dynamics.

Thanks again for listening and commenting!

Cool Wendy. A day in the life of our local surgeons. I like the Crocodile Dundee percussion effect. It adds another layer of creepiness. But the impact comes from the morbidly descriptive lyrics. Gosh, I hope I don’t need surgery in the near future. I’ll be thinking of your song when going under the knife.

Best, John

Wendy,
Long time no talk!
Great to see you writing.
It maintains that evil feel throughout, music matches the lyric well.
The spoken word comments Ricki mentioned are worth fixing.
So cool to see and hear your work.

Hi Wendy,

I really enjoy your abstract approach to this music, it feels actually a little hypnotizing. It sounds like you've been experimenting a bit here, but I don't think you are in over your head. I hear Riki as well--one thought I had for production might be on the speaking parts to back off a little with the reverb and pan some left and some right to give you a back and forth movement of those lines--(Beatles Helter Skelter) experiment. Other thoughts, maybe add a little more delay on a couple of verse end lines--in other words this song can't be too dramatic with effects.

What a cool groove you have going here, and you have a awesome vocal tone--I remember thinking the same thing when I heard you sing Haley.

steady-eddie

I have been streaming a lot of VU lately. I even watched a video of Lou explaining the chord progression he played on Sweet Jane. Apparently, there is a chord he plays that many of the charts you find on-line do not include.

I am going to revise the B of C a bit soon. I asked Mike Z. to sprinkle some magic dust on it. I believe he can make the vox pop so the words are not buried in the mix.

Thanks again for listening and commenting.

Thank you sir! I am going to fix the vox stuff.

Dave,

I was still working on this on Halloween. I wish I could have finished it. That is a huge compliment that it sounds like a Calvin song. He's one of my favorites!

I definitely hear the Jefferson Airplane influence in this song.

I think it's coming along nicely - I certainly wouldn't scrap it.

Keep pluggin' away and post the next version when you have it. I would be interested in hearing where you go with this for the final version.

The only artistic suggestion I can think of would be to do a key change and SING the part "Am I my brother's keeper" - really peel paint here with the vocals. Anyway, just a thought.

I liked it!

Peace,
TC

[/quote]
Thanks for listening to this. It is definitely outside my comfort zone. This is the first new song I have been able to write to a point that I actually didn't throw it in the trash. I have been working on stuff but self-editing to the point that I quit for a time.

The spoken-word part is just some dialogue from the bible where Cain slays Abel. God asks him where his brother is and Cain asks God "am I my brother's keeper?"

The murder of the Saudi journalist along with the politics of the day inspired this. I feel like the world is moving in a terrible direction. I don't know what to do other than write about it.

I think going up in places on the vox will add some dynamics.

Thanks again for listening and commenting![/quote]

I've been in the same sort of rut....this whole year. Maybe it's the politic of the culture, and / or the seemingly rise of evil doings in the world.
Anyways, your song can certainly be applied to any number of evils of attitude in the era,
Good job...and good stuff!
-Tom

New link above. This is still a work in progress.

That riff is pretty cool, is there some alt tuning involved? Sounds like the bottom notes are tuned down.

Sounds like something Hole, or Alanis Morrisette might have done.

I must say the picture of you and your partners, doesn't match this music...hehe

Getting creepier every listen so, good job there!

Ricki

Thanks everyone for listening to this. I am giving up on it. I told my guitar guy to hold-off on a solo or whatever.

I will get around to crits for those who listened/commented. I'm not going to post on this any more though so the thread will die a natural death.

Again. Thank you folks.